Hawks from Every Angle: How to Identify Raptors In Flight by Jerry Liguori Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of Hawks from Every Angle: How to Identify Raptors In Flight
Book Review: Helpful even for a bird-challenged guy like me
Summary: 5 Stars
I'm a bird guy. I absolutely love birds, and the birds I love more than any others are hawks. When I die, I want to come back as a hawk.
The problem (if it is a problem) is that I'm no naturalist. I seem constitutionally incapable of identifying most birds. Get me past the typical visitors to my backyard feeders--the junkos, sparrows, wrens, cardinals, goldfinches, thrushes, humming birds, and occasional woodpecker--and I'm pretty lost.
But because I so love hawks, and because they've recently reappeared in great numbers in my neck of the woods (central PA), I thought I'd give Liguori's book a try.
I'm glad I did. The photographs are stunning--beautiful enough to please the eye, but at the same time crisp and detailed enough to serve as a guide for hawk-spotting. I found especially helpful Liguori's shots of hawks at different flight positions--soaring, gliding, stooping, hovering, and so on. Equally helpful are the charts he provides that compare body, wing and head shapes of different kinds of hawks, falcons, and eagles. Ditto on the migration charts.
There's only one thing Liguori's guidebook doesn't have that I wish it did: photographs of perched hawks. I see lots of hawks when I'm driving that are perched on tree branches and electric lines, and I still have difficulty identifying them: redtail? Swainson's? Cooper's? Hopefully, the next edition of Hawks from Every Angle will include the perch angle as well. (In all fairness to Liguori, however, his book is subtitled "How to Identify Raptors in Flight.")
It would also be convenient were the book a bit smaller in size. It's broadness makes it a little burdensome in the field. But it could well be that a smaller format would've meant less precise photographs. If that's the case, the tradeoff is a good one.
Book Review: Hawks
Summary: 5 Stars
The illustations make it much easier to identify hawks in the sky and on the ground. It will be a valuable companion on my bird walks in the Audubon and to ID the hawks soaring overhead and through the woods by my home.
Libbie
Book Review: Extremely informative, with excellent photography
Summary: 5 Stars
I though this was an excellent resource for identifying hawks in flight. The photos are very informative, and attractive as well. The guide is, in my opinion, very comprehensive and extremely well written. Book Review: Hawks from Every Angle
Summary: 5 Stars
A super-useful reference guide that goes well with HAWKS IN FLIGHT -- and actually I would probably look at this one first. Photographs and text both contain a lot of helpful information to assist in raptor identification -- though the "pitfalls" shots make it clear that not every bird will be identifiable.
Mileage obviously varies, but as a Californian I don't feel shortchanged by this book and have used it particularly for Sharpie/Cooper's differentiation.
Book Review: another mistitled hawk book
Summary: 2 Stars
If you're looking for a book that covers all the raptors that regularly occur in North America, forget it. A more honest title would've been 'Raptors of Northeastern Hawkwatch Sites.' Even then, northeastern hawkwatchers won't find Harris' Hawk in the book. The raptors Liguori does cover are done well, by and large, and I was particularly impressed with the treatments of both Harlan's Hawk and the Northern Harrier. But if you live in the West, as I do, you'll find the book less useful than the title suggests. Get yourself a Clark and Wheeler--it'll serve you much better. I'm looking forward to that frabjous day when hawkwatchers will escape their eastern bias, and discover that we have hawks in the West too.
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